The clock has well and truly struck mudguard o'clock now, and there's plenty to choose from out there. Vavert is a brand you may not of heard of; they're fairly new to the game and their product range revolves around accessories that you can colour code to your bike. As such, the Fixed mudguard comes in five colours. Whichever you pick, you can be assured it'll do a good job at a low price.

I had a set of the brown ones, which were a decent enough match with my Charge Spoon saddle and Brooks leather bar tape. There's two widths, of which we had the 35mm version suitable for tyres up to 28mm. There's a wider 45mm version too. They're plastic construction with metal fittings, and you get a rubber spray flap at the rear (and rubber end cap at the front) and a rear reflector thrown into the bargain. If brown's not your thing you can have black (with blue or lime green piping), white (red piping) or silver. I like brown though. There, I've said it.

Fitting the Vaverts is easy enough; you don't get fancy-dan quick releases at the front or the miniature fixing bolts of SKS but the Nyloc nuts do the job just fine and it's a simple job to get the 'guards on. A pair of bolt croppers is handy for cutting the stays to size, and there are rubber covers for the sharp ends.

In use they're solid and dependable. The guard itself is plenty strong enough that it doesn't bend or rattle across the rougher surfaces, and the solid stays keep them from rubbing and they're simple to adjust. It's pretty easy to get them close enough to the wheel and they're long enough to to cut out just about all the road spray. Your winter-riding friends will appreciate the extra length of the mudflap on the rear too, when they're sucking your wheel.

Dave is a founding father of road.cc and responsible for kicking the server when it breaks. In a previous life he was a graphic designer but he's also a three-time Mountain Bike Bog Snorkelling world champion, and remains unbeaten through the bog. Dave rides all sorts of bikes but tends to prefer metal ones. He's getting old is why.

it could bear being longer at the front. but my experience is that the length of the mudguard doesn't affect spray from the road surface onto your shoes that much, as that water's getting thrown up from the contact patch, not spun round the wheel. a nice wide flap can be a help though

Seriously? QRs are not for convenience, they are a pretty important safety feature for the front mudguard. You can do some nasty damage if you get something jammed and the front wheel locks up. I really wouldn't risk bolting guards directly to the forks like that.

I have these in 35mm and silver which is quite dark and matches a Ti bike nicely. I've been really pleased with them. I used a 'problem solver' nut to get the front one mounted correctly on my carbon fork. Not tried 28mm tyres - think they'd be quite tight. Good for 25mm though. In 20+ years of London commuting which includes long tow path sections I've never had an incident where I wished I'd had QRs on the front.

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Every product is thoroughly tested for as long as it takes to get a real insight into whether it works or not. Our reviewers are experienced cyclists that we trust to be objective, and we strive to ensure that all opinions expressed are backed up by facts, but reviews are always a reviewer's informed opinion, not a definitive verdict. We don't intentionally try to break anything (except locks) but we do try to look for weak points in any design. The overall score is not just an average of the other scores. It reflects both a product's function and value. Good scores are more common than bad, because fortunately good products are more common than bad. Here's what they mean: